The Queen's Story
by Never Once
Summary: As the Queen lies on her death bed, she tells her life story to her lover, the genie.


The Queen's Story

TheEvilQueen

Chapter One

As the hiss of the snakes gave them music, they kissed passionately, as only lovers of their magnitude could. He felt one of her hands leave his chest, but thought nothing of it until her neck snapped up, as if looking at the sky, and she crumbled into his arms.

"No." He caught her quickly, looking at the blood dripped free of her middle finger. "No my love, don't leave me yet."

She sighed contently. "With such a small bite it will take an hour for the poison to completely go through me, perhaps more, perhaps less. Lay me out on the bed- please."

He cradled her in his arms like a bride and laid her out as beautifully as she deserved. The blue sequence on her dress reflected the candles and torches and her eyes glittered with pain, but happiness- she would be free within an hour.

"My love, I could have found another way. There were so many other options than for you to die now, in my arms." He sat beside her on the bed, tracing her cheekbone with his thumb.

"Let me tell you my story, before I die. Please, it would bring me so much happiness to unburden myself."

"Of course." He kissed the curled fingers of her unbitten hand. "I could listen to you for all eternity and never tire of your voice."

Her lips twitched into a small smile. "You flatter me so much. Now please, just listen. Don't speak, don't ask questions. Just listen."

He nodded silently. He could do that for the rest of his life. "Yes my queen."

"I was born a miller's daughter in the Frontlands. I know not of my mother- my father raised me alone. When I turned nineteen, the ogre wars began. By the time I was twenty they were having anyone fifteen to fifty serve in battle. My village refused to give away any of our children and so the Duke of the Frontlands torched every house. A knight saved most of us- his name was Cerys. And when he had rescued everyone he could, he came back to Father and me. It took only a few weeks for us to fall completely in love. And then the Duke came and found all the survivors and he demanded to know why Father wouldn't let me into battle." She took a shaky breath and looked away from her lover sadly.

"He was terrified that I'd just be taken from him, so he lied. He said I had the ability to turn straw into gold and such a gift was too rare to waste in battle. I don't know why, but the Duke believed him enough to have me taken to his palace so I could prove myself." She closed her eyes and tears leaked out of them.

_"You can't just take me from him! He's my father!" I cry and struggle as the guards wrap strong arms around my stomach and yank me away from my home. "He needs me; he's far too old to work the mill at his age. Please!" I jerk harder, but they still get me onto the Duke's saddle. _

_ "You're twenty years and you want to remain with your father? Rather childish dear." The Duke tells me heartlessly. _

_ "He needs me; his health is not in its best. Please, let me stay. I can serve after his death. I'll sell you the mill." _

_ "You'll be married then dearie. If you prove this unimaginable gift, then your hand will be in my sons. I can't let you stay and marry and be worthless when the old man dies." _

_ "Please, I'm all he has. He's all I have." The tears half blind me. _

_ "Well, if your gift is true, then you shall have your father and my son. Come." Father shrinks in the distance and when we reach his cold palace, they lock me in a tower with straw. "In three days' time, if this straw is not gold, then you will be executed for lying to me- you and your father." And he locks me inside. _

_ A day and a passes and I'm crying uncontrollably when a small man climbs through my window. "Don't say a word or I'll slit your throat." He flashes a knife at me. "Is there a way into the palace from here? Are their guards nearby?" _

_ I shrug my shoulders. "I haven't an idea. I've been locked in here for a whole day and night and won't be released for another." _

_ He stands and runs his eyes over me. "Why? What could such a beauty have done to the Duke of the Frontlands?" _

_ "My Father claimed I could spin straw into gold- he didn't want me fighting in the ogre wars. The guards used to stand by my door, but my crying annoyed them so much that they went to the base of the tower." _

_ He nods. "I will have power very soon- unimaginable power. And with it I can turn all of this straw into the purest gold. But it will come with a price." _

_ "I have nothing here. And my home is too far for you to reach and come back tonight." _

_ "Have you ever lain with a man?" _

_ The question catches me off guard. A fiery blush turns me pink as a setting sun. "I- I have not yet." _

_ "Then your price will be that." He says simply. _

_ "My virginity for gold?" The thought, no matter what it means (my freedom!) terrifies me. _

_ "It is the only thing you have dearie." He points out plainly. "Take it or leave it." _

_ And because I hope Cerys will understand when I return to him, I agree. And after a fire that night, the straw is gold and the Duke gives me in marriage to his son. _

"I got pregnant." She told her genie, looking back at him. "I bore a son and pretended that it was my husbands. But then a plague swept the land and robbed me of my first husband and my first child. He wasn't even a full year when we had to bury him." The genie wiped away the tears on her cheek, gaining him another small, sad smile. "Thank you. I was hungry for power and money and love- I knew not of Cerys and had only regained my father after my first marriage. I spent ten years with a sorceress who had become my friend and she taught me her darkest magic. That was when Snow's father found me- a widow of ten years and only thirty, living with a sorceress. He thought he'd rescued me and claimed my beauty reminded him of his first wife and lovely daughter. He asked me to marry him. I could think of nothing else to do but agree. I would have power and money and perhaps love. It was the only option." She paused again and closed her eyes as the death-filled pain spread through her more.

"Are you alright my queen?"

"I am well enough to speak. The pain brings my death-filled freedom, I will bear it happily. Three years ago, Cerys came and found me. The king was on a hunting trip and we had been separated for so long- nothing could have stopped us. Snow heard us and after he left questioned me greatly, but she did not tell the king until I discovered my pregnancy. She betrayed me then and when I bore my daughter, I had her for only two days' time. When I awoke the third day, both my husband and my daughter were gone. I tried to make him tell me where he had taken her or if he had killed her, but he told me nothing. He thinks now that I have forgiven him, but I never shall. He stole my daughter- my hope, my joy, my love." She gripped her lovers arm intensely. "Promise me you will find her. Her hair was black as midnight and her eyes were the strongest blue. I named her Isabel. Tell her how much I loved her, how I never wished to part with her. Promise me, please."

"I promise my queen." He bent down to kiss her lips and when he sat back up, her skin was pale as snow. "Do you feel death's door, my queen?"

"I'll be entering it soon, the pain tells me so."

"Is there any more you wish to tell me your majesty?"

"No, that is my story. Thank my father for his gift- tell him how much happiness it brought me. If you want to, tell the king of our love. Tell him of the happiness you brought me, more than he ever did."

He nodded and squeezed her hand to try to comfort her.

The king and his guards burst in just then. "Traitor! Liar! Thief!" The old man shouted, pointing at the genie as he held his wife's hand. "Bring him here immediately."

"No!" The genie lept up protectively in front of his lover. "She is on death's door; can I not be with her when her life ends?"

"Go. Obey him." The Queen smiled sadly up at him. "If I die with or without you, our hearts will still be together."

Not minding the angry king and the running guards, the genie bent over and kissed her passionately on the lips and when their mouths broke, her eyes widened with utter pain and strong happiness and she squeezed his hand with all her strength. And when her hand let go and right before the guards seized him, she closed her eyes with contented happiness.

She was free.


End file.
